Undercover Economist: A sense of entitlement is all very well – but what about a pay rise?

Companies are always on the lookout for cheap ways to reward their employees, and what could be cheaper than a grandiose title or a purely symbolic “employee of the month” award? As the comic-strip character Dilbert’s pointy-haired boss once announced, “I’m promoting you from senior engineer to lead engineer. The pay’s the same but people will disrespect you less.”